Four Days and Cookin'

The question of "What do we eat on Christmas Day this year?" was settled a couple of weeks ago. Participants at the feast are these three; King of the household, Yours Truly; (aka Queen of the household) and the elder Prince, pictured here on his second Christmas with his favourite gift, a push-duck. We lived in San Diego at the time, hence the lack of waist-deep snow and parkas.

The menu choices for Christmas Dinner were:
1) Boomer Queen  - a plate of deli meats and cheeses, a fruit tray, and chocolates.

2) Old-School Queen - a turkey roast and sides from our excellent supermarket deli and chocolates.

[Disclaimer: Blogger does not allow me to use accents so I cannot spell the names of the Spanish dishes correctly. Please bear with me as I slaughter the language espanol.]

3) Mamacita Queen with Princely Assistance - homemade tamales with mole negro sauce, cheese enchiladas, pollo espanol, refried beans,  Spanish rice, guacamole and taco chips and chocolates. (You do not need to be psychic to be sensing a chocolate theme!)

And the choice is Window number three! So Ian did a mighty shop, and a second shop to get what he couldn't find at the first two stores. Masa harina appears to be in short supply this year.  And a third shop to get what the mamacita forgot to tell him to buy the first two times.

We have been cooking in bits and fits for days. The chicken is cooked, boned and in the freezer waiting to join its toothsome sauce laden with red peppers, green olives and onions. The tamale filling awaits swaddling in corn flour and parchment jackets. The mole sauce waits in the freezer to join the tamales, the tortillas are at the ready to be lovingly rolled with cheese and salsa. The frijoles have been mooshed and fried and a bag of Texas-grown Jasmine rice will shake hands with tomatoes, garlic, onion and jalapeno peppers on Christmas morning.

I remember a Christmas long ago when I was six or seven when my dad, mother and I bundled into a 1949 green Plymouth and drove across three states, all day, all night, to share such a feast with my older brother and his family, who'd driven from the other direction to meet us. I remember nothing about presents that Christmas, but I remember the food and the tight embrace of my brother's arms when I crawled out of the back seat of the car. The adults talked long into the night in a crowded motel room while trucks roared by on the highway, their lights sliding across the back wall filtered through the thin curtains. 

Not having our younger Prince here takes some of the shine off the day, but he will surely have a lovely day with his wife and friends, and some birds fly farther than others, Lord knows I flew far from where I began.  

And back to today, when my household King has apparently exceeded the limits of patience of the password server at Google once too often with his inability to recall his password from one day to the next. Just now, when he poked the "forgot password" link, Google came back with, "Try to remember your password!" When he couldn't it told him to "Write down a hint this time" before allowing him to enter a new password.  It seems that at least one Google server has gotten a personality for Christmas, and it's either his mother's (or mine).  God bless us every one.